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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22513615">September, 1991</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blissymbolics/pseuds/Blissymbolics'>Blissymbolics</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>IT (Movies - Muschietti)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Homophobia, M/M, Reference to Underage Sexual Activity, Teenage sexuality, just casually traumatizing some children</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 09:53:58</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,910</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22513615</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blissymbolics/pseuds/Blissymbolics</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The lights were off and they were beneath the covers, and she only saw them for a split second before pulling the door shut, but it was impossible to hide what they were doing.<br/><br/>Now all three of them are sitting at the kitchen table, dressed in pajamas, the sweetness of just twenty minutes ago forgotten, an irretrievable memory at this point.<br/><br/>And he’s scared. He’s fucking terrified. He’s never been more frightened of his mom in his life.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>36</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>346</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>September, 1991</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/samansucks/gifts">samansucks</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p1">The sweat culminating on Richie’s palms feels grotesque. His hairline is damp with it too. His stomach is pulsing and cramping beneath the drum of his belly. His glasses begin slipping down the bridge of his nose, so he pushes them up again, only for them to begin their slow descent once again.</p><p class="p1">Eddie is sitting next to him in an identical wooden chair: a set they took from his grandma’s house after she was moved to the nursing home. They’re old and creaky, and don’t have any padding despite his parents’ constant complaints that they need to get some.</p><p class="p1">And he’s sore. He didn’t expect to be this sore. And he really hopes his mom won’t ask why he keeps shifting in his seat.</p><p class="p1">The lights were off and they were beneath the covers, and she only saw them for a split second before pulling the door shut, but it was impossible to hide what they were doing.</p><p class="p1">Now all three of them are sitting at the kitchen table, dressed in pajamas, the sweetness of just twenty minutes ago forgotten, an irretrievable memory at this point.</p><p class="p1">His mom is sitting across from them, dressed in her grey robe with dirty blonde hair hanging loose around her shoulders. The clock above the fridge is ticking loudly, and he suddenly remembers being a toddler and bursting into tears when his parents told him that the ticking sound meant that time was passing. He wouldn’t stop crying until his dad took the batteries out, and then he happily went back to playing with his pasta, secure in the knowledge that time was standing still again.</p><p class="p1">He’s afraid to look at Eddie. Even out of the corner of his eye. He’s afraid his mom will get angry if he so much as glances at him, shows any interest in his existence, expresses any concern for the labored heaves of his chest or the twitching of his legs.</p><p class="p1">Richie had no plan for this. Neither of them did. They generally didn’t think about the future beyond their math test on Monday or whatever movie they were going to see on Saturday, along with vague, distant projections of what life might be like after Derry.</p><p class="p1">But what’s supposed to happen right now? What could his mom possibly say to him? Based on the unholy silence that’s been dragging on for the last two minutes, she definitely doesn’t want to have this talk anymore than he does.</p><p class="p1">And he’s scared. He’s fucking terrified. He’s never been more frightened of his mom in his life.</p><p class="p1">“So how long has this been going on?” she finally asks, her tone hard to read.</p><p class="p1">“Three months,” Richie answers quickly.</p><p class="p1">It’s not technically a lie. It’s been three months since they first started taking each other’s clothes off. He doesn’t need to tell her about everything that came before.</p><p class="p1">She gives no response, and he feels his fear building like the metallic clunk of a rollercoaster beginning its ascent. Is this what Eddie feels all the time? Whenever he sees someone coughing, or accidentally cuts his finger, or loses himself reading about some new disease until he can’t breathe, as if his lungs could absorb the bacteria simply by reading the words on the page.</p><p class="p1">And Richie feels sick too. His eyes are burning and his throat is clenched tight. And after holding it back for so long, he finally feels two tears fall in parallel streams down his cheeks. More follow quickly. A sob catches in his throat as he hastily wipes his nose against his sleeve before pressing his fists beneath his glasses.</p><p class="p1">“Oh sweetheart, it’s okay. Don’t worry, I still love you.”</p><p class="p1">The tone of her voice is familiar, and her words are too. She said the same thing to him back when he was nine and ate all the chocolate they’d bought for Easter. But at the time he found her words unnecessary because of course she still loved him. It’d be stupid to think she’d revoke that over a bag of chocolate eggs. But now, he can’t be so sure.</p><p class="p1">He keeps his fists pressed against his eyes, fixating on the colorful blotches and bright swirls dancing behind his eyelids.</p><p class="p1">He hears her clear her throat, but he’s still too afraid to look. He wants to cover his ears. He wants this to stop.</p><p class="p1">“I’m sorry I have to ask, but have you been doing that with anyone else besides Eddie?”</p><p class="p1">Richie quickly shakes his head no, his face flushing with embarrassment.</p><p class="p1">“Okay, good,” she says softly. “Eddie, have you?”</p><p class="p1">Richie finally pulls his fists away from his eyes, but still restrains himself from turning towards Eddie, the humiliation sinking deep in his stomach.</p><p class="p1">Eddie doesn’t say anything, but be must have shook his head too because his mom repeats the exact same words:</p><p class="p1">“Okay, good.”</p><p class="p1">More silence. More ticking. It’s almost one in the morning now.</p><p class="p1">They’d waited past midnight for this exact reason. His mom never stays up past ten, and is usually dressed for bed by nine. And his dad is out in Waterville helping his grandparents move. This wasn’t supposed to happen. She never stays up this late. Why tonight? Why this?</p><p class="p1">Richie finally risks looking up at her, but quickly snaps his eyes back down to the pockmarked table. God, she looks so old without her makeup. The wrinkles around her mouth and brow look deeper in the overhead lights, and her hair looks stringy and dry. She’d hugged him just before he went upstairs with Eddie after dinner. She’d hugged him and smoothed back his curls and now she may never hug him again.</p><p class="p1">“Do you know what’s going on right now? Have you talked about AIDS at all in school?”</p><p class="p1">Richie swallows something sharp.</p><p class="p1">He honestly doesn’t. He doesn’t read the news. He doesn’t like it. He tries not to keep up.</p><p class="p1">But Eddie does. Eddie knows everything. He knows so much that sometimes Richie’s surprised he can even go outside.</p><p class="p1">“Yeah,” Eddie answers softly, his first spoken word since sitting at the table. “We talked about it a bit in bio last year.”</p><p class="p1">His mom nods, her expression as sad as when she sat Richie down and told him his grandpa was dead.</p><p class="p1">“So you know how it spreads, right?”</p><p class="p1">Richie nods. There’s no way in hell he’ll say it out loud, and he knows she doesn’t have the guts to say it either.</p><p class="p1">“Mr. Peters told us you can get it from blood transfusions,” Eddie says meekly, “but we know that’s not the only way.”</p><p class="p1">“Okay.”</p><p class="p1">
  <em>Okay. Okay. Okay.</em>
</p><p class="p1">Is that all she's going to say?</p><p class="p1">No, he has to keep things in perspective. Rationally, this is probably the best outcome he could’ve hoped for. She could’ve screamed at him. Hit him. Locked him out of the house like Matthew Yerkes’ parents did. And Matt wasn’t even caught with another boy. It was just a rumor that went too far, but it was still a week before his parents finally let him back inside.</p><p class="p1">No, this is better. It’s awkward, and weird as fuck, but it’ll be fine. She still loves him. She won’t kick him out, despite all the things he’s heard her say about the men in town she doesn’t like. The ones who dress with too much color and get those awful piercings. The ones who speak with that ridiculous inflection and laugh too loud in public, always making a scene and begging for attention. How sad their lives must be if they feel the need to structure their personalities around these obnoxious mating rituals, broadcasting the unseemly details of their private lives in the buttons of their shirts and the pitch of their voice.</p><p class="p1">No, he’s the exception. Of course he’s the exception.</p><p class="p1">She lets out a sigh and turns her head to the dark window above the sink, lightly tapping her painted nails against the lacquered wood.</p><p class="p1">“Can you promise me that you won’t do that with anyone else besides each other? If you need to do it, only do it with each other. If any older men try to make you do anything like that, even if they just look at you that way, you tell me or the police right away, understand?”</p><p class="p1">He’s nodding his head before she even finishes, reacting to the desperate escalation in her voice. Her pitch is high and broken by the end, the final word both a plea and a demand.</p><p class="p1">He hopes that’s it. He hopes that’s the end. Then they can go back to never talking about things like this again. He can pretend she doesn’t know and she can pretend the same. That’s all he wants.</p><p class="p1">“Okay,” Richie replies. Two syllables, and he chokes on both.</p><p class="p1">She lets out another sigh, the intensity in her frame deflating a bit, and Richie thinks it might be over.</p><p class="p1">“And sweetheart, please don’t tell your dad, okay?”</p><p class="p1">Richie shudders hard.</p><p class="p1">No, of course he’s not going to tell him. He might never tell him.</p><p class="p1">He still remembers being ten when his dad came home from work in a rage. Richie was watching TV in the living room with the sound turned low so he could overhear his father shouting from the kitchen.</p><p class="p1">From what he caught, apparently his dad had heard from Dave or John or someone that one of his regular clients was also a frequent customer over at the Falcon, and supposedly went home with a different man each night. His dad was screaming about how he’d had his fingers in the guy’s mouth. Gloves or not, he was touching his fucking spit, making his gums bleed, scraping away all the plaque nestled between his teeth.</p><p class="p1">The incident didn’t mean much to Richie at the time. He only remembered it because it was the most he’d ever heard his dad say fuck within a single conversation. There was talk of getting tested, but what would Dr. Nelson over at the clinic say if he came in for it? Then there was talk of suing, but by then the commercial break was over and Richie decided he should go back to watching Miami Vice.</p><p class="p1">But now that he’s fifteen, he understands what his dad was talking about. Why he was so angry. And he thought about it every time his dad touched him. Every time he sat in the dentist chair and felt his dad’s fingers poke around his mouth, scolding him for not flossing as often as he should.</p><p class="p1">He wondered if his dad would be afraid to touch him after he found out. If he’d scream the same way he did about that other man; the one he refused to see ever again.</p><p class="p1">So no, Richie won’t tell him. Not ever.</p><p class="p1">“Eddie, can you go back upstairs?” His mom says slowly, as if Eddie were too stupid to understand the simple command.</p><p class="p1">Richie really doesn’t want to be alone with her, but he also knows that Eddie doesn’t deserve to be here for this. And honestly, he’s terrified of what his mom will say to him once all the witnesses are gone.</p><p class="p1">“Eddie brought his stuff down in case–“</p><p class="p1">“No, it’s okay, he can stay for now.”</p><p class="p1">Richie looks at her skeptically. There’s no way in hell she’s going to let him join Eddie in his room after this. So sure, maybe he can stay for now, but probably never again.</p><p class="p1">Eddie looks at him, hesitant and apologetic. Richie just gives him a small nod to let him know that he’ll be okay. He can leave. He doesn’t have to be here for this.</p><p class="p1">After a moment of silent protest, Eddie stands from his chair and starts walking down the hall, dragging his feet up the stairs, and finally Richie hears the distant sound of his bedroom door falling shut.</p><p class="p1">That’s the same room where they first touched each other. Where they’ve been together many times before. The place where Richie first told him he loved him and Eddie said it in return.</p><p class="p1">Now they may never be allowed to be alone in that room ever again.</p><p class="p1">The silence stretches on.</p><p class="p1">What’s left to say?</p><p class="p1">It’s not like she’s going to give him a nuts and bolts description of what he should and shouldn’t do. She’s always been too squeamish to talk about shit like that. He remembers being five and asking her how Mrs. Davis got a baby in her belly, only for her to mutter something about God and miracles before ignoring him entirely when he asked how the baby was going to get out. Then she nodded her head when he asked if they were going to cut her open. By coincidence, that ended up being the case, so up until ten he thought all babies were born via c-section. That would be a funny story if his life wasn’t currently falling apart.</p><p class="p1">Suddenly, his mom’s expression changes. She reigns in her sagging posture and plasters a smile on her face, forced and off-putting.</p><p class="p1">“So, are there any girls you like in school? Anyone you’re thinking of asking to the dance?”</p><p class="p1">Richie swears some gear in his head slips out of place. Everything tilts to the left. The angle of his mom’s smile is unsettling, like that of a deranged person in a movie, a comparison only exacerbated by the fresh tear tracks running down her cheeks.</p><p class="p1">“Not really,” he answers quietly, unsure what else to say.</p><p class="p1">Her smile falters a bit.</p><p class="p1">“I remember you had crushes on girls a lot when you were younger. You used to play with Deborah Howe and her friends all the time.”</p><p class="p1">That’s right, he did. When he was in kindergarten and they let him join their fairy kingdom game in the tree line by the playground. Fairy Kingdom. Another great joke under any other circumstances.</p><p class="p1">But by first grade they started shunning him, telling him it was nothing personal, they just couldn’t be friends with boys anymore. Because boys and girls were two separate species divided by the infallible truths of biology. Only boyfriends were allowed to cross that chasm, and he definitely wasn’t their boyfriend.</p><p class="p1">God, he hasn’t thought about that in years. He never could’ve predicted how much he would change since then.</p><p class="p1">Now he’s fifteen and he knows what beer, wine, and whiskey all taste like. He knows how to repair bikes and build a treehouse. He knows how to do geometric proofs, write research papers, and read Shakespeare. He has opinions on politics and can name every country. He’s beaten his dad at chess six times and can roll a joint and haggle with the guy at the music store. And he knows what sex is and what Eddie tastes like. He knows how to kiss, put on a condom, and make someone come, which is more than most boys his age can say. And if worst comes to worst, he could probably teach himself how to drive and get out of here. He can read maps, buy clothes for a handful of dimes, and work odd jobs without even having to lie about his age.</p><p class="p1">He knows he’s an adult in every way except legally. But right now, he feels like he’s seven again, listening to his mom yell at him for breaking a plate and crying because she refused to believe it was an accident.</p><p class="p1">He’s too scared to tell her that no, he never had crushes on any of those girls. And the sporadic and forced crushes he did feel throughout elementary school were nothing more than radial blips in comparison to the love he’s felt for Eddie for the last three years. And yes, it is love. And if she says it isn’t, then he may be forced to tear apart his parents’ marriage brick by brick. He’s so pathetically in love that it’s practically half his personality at this point. Eddie was the only beautiful thing in this ugly fucking world. He grew up with him. They helped create each other. Richie doesn’t want to know what kind of person he would be without Eddie changing and growing alongside him.</p><p class="p1">He knows his parents never had anything like that. Sometimes it feels like they’re nothing more than two strangers who happen to live together.</p><p class="p1">“I remember helping you make valentines for all the girls in your class,” she says mournfully, as if it were some joyful memory that he’s now desecrated.</p><p class="p1">“All the boys had to do that.”</p><p class="p1">“But you put a lot of effort into them.”</p><p class="p1">Richie doesn’t know what to say to that. He honestly can’t even remember. He has so many crystal clear memories from age three onwards, but he can’t remember anything about whatever craft paper hearts he apparently put so much work into.</p><p class="p1">Why is his mom even doing this? Is she trying to get him to admit that he likes girls too? That maybe he was only fooling around with Eddie because he was curious and bored and maybe intimidated by the prospect of winning over a girl? He already knows that’s exactly what she’s trying to do. And he should just lie and say yes, but he’s too stubborn for that. And apparently he hates making things easy for himself.</p><p class="p1">“What about your friend Beverly? She’s very pretty.”</p><p class="p1">He nods noncommittally. “Yeah, she is.”</p><p class="p1">“Why don’t you ask her to the dance?”</p><p class="p1">“I wasn’t gonna go.”</p><p class="p1">“Why don’t you just ask her?”</p><p class="p1">“I don’t want to.”</p><p class="p1">His voice is louder now, almost back to its regular volume. He remembers when his voice first started to drop and his mom retreated into some weird phase of mourning, lamenting that she would never hear his prepubescent pitch ever again. She got weird about stuff like that sometimes.</p><p class="p1">He shifts in his seat. Fuck, he’s still sore, but he managed to forget about it amidst all the other distractions.</p><p class="p1">The worst part is he was right on the verge of telling Eddie to stop. It was his first time, and it hurt a lot more than he was anticipating – a lot more than it hurt for Eddie – and the mood was shot from the second Eddie began pressing inside. He was maybe two seconds away from telling Eddie that he needed to tap out when the door opened. Twenty seconds later and they would’ve been in the clear. None of this would’ve happened. They could’ve laughed about it beneath the covers and fallen asleep with their backs pressed against each other.</p><p class="p1">But no, they couldn’t be so lucky.</p><p class="p1">His mom is tapping her nails again, but now the expression on her face is tensed with frustration. As if Richie’s refusal to ask Beverly out were akin to whining about taking out the trash.</p><p class="p1">“I know Eddie has always looked up to you,” she says with a tense softness. “And you’ve been a very good friend to him. He’s lucky to have a friend like you. But if he’s making you do anything you don’t want to, you know it’s okay to tell him no, right?”</p><p class="p1">“He’s not though.”</p><p class="p1">His words come out fast and harsh, angry that she would even suggest something like that.</p><p class="p1">He wants to tell her that he’s the one who initiated him. He’s the one who made the first move, leaned in for their first kiss, even if Eddie was the first one to reach under his shirt. But no, he can’t say any of that. Because if his mom knew how much Eddie meant to him, she’d never let them speak again.</p><p class="p1">He should’ve just lied. Said it was a one-time thing. They were curious and confused, just bored teenagers trying to get off any way they could. She still would’ve been upset. Distraught even. But maybe her entire perception of him wouldn’t have crumbled. Not that he cares if it does.</p><p class="p1">Oh well. It’s too late to backtrack now.</p><p class="p1">“Still, you know you’re both too young for anything like that, right?”</p><p class="p1">He wants to contradict her, but knows that would only make things worse.</p><p class="p1">He knows they’re not too young. He knows plenty of kids who were fooling around at twelve. There was a girl at their school who got pregnant at thirteen. He and Eddie were less than three years from adulthood and there was no law against teenagers having sex. And they were clean and in love and it’s not like they could get each other pregnant, so what was the big fucking deal?</p><p class="p1">But he knows she won’t take any of it, so he simply grits his teeth and nods.</p><p class="p1">“And if Eddie were a girl you know I’d be saying the exact same thing, right?”</p><p class="p1">He nods again.</p><p class="p1">If Eddie were a girl she would’ve just grounded him for a few weeks. Maybe revoked his allowance and awkwardly avoided eye contact for a month. She wouldn’t be like this: glassy-eyed and hysterical, somehow both heart-broken and enraged. If Eddie were a girl then his dad wouldn’t give a shit, and Richie definitely wouldn’t be weighing the odds of getting kicked out.</p><p class="p1">“If I don’t let Eddie come over anymore, will you just go somewhere else?”</p><p class="p1">“Yes,” he answers without pause for thought.</p><p class="p1">And they will. They’ll go to the clubhouse, or Mike’s barn, or hell maybe the empty shed on the edge of the football field. He’ll run away if she tries to banish Eddie permanently. He’ll do it. He’s certain of it. And he wants her to believe it.</p><p class="p1">Her tapping comes to a halt. The crease between her brows is deep, her volatile temper cracking around the seams. She wants to scream. He can tell. She’s screamed at him for the most asinine things imaginable and he’s screamed right back. He can feel the tension humming beneath a thin layer of film, and he knows that one wrong look is all it’ll take to ignite the room as if it were pumped full of carbon monoxide. It’s just a matter of who will light the match.</p><p class="p1">“Fine,” she spits. “Go back upstairs. And tell Eddie to come back down. I’m driving him home.”</p><p class="p1">Richie’s anger spikes, even though it was stupid to hope that she’d let Eddie stay after what just happened.</p><p class="p1">He stands from his stupidly uncomfortable chair, pushing past the sharp pain between his legs, and starts walking towards the hall with his fists clenched tight, his shame and embarrassment replaced with gnawing rage.</p><p class="p1">He never bothers controlling it in school. He’ll call someone a bitch to their face along with a millionother creative variations, but he knows he’s treading on thin ice, and he doesn’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that he could be one wrong word away from sleeping outside.</p><p class="p1">“Wait, one more thing,” she calls just before he walks into the hall, his hand gripping the doorframe. “Do any of your other friends know about this? Anyone from school?”</p><p class="p1">He shakes his head no on impulse, knowing it’s what she wants to hear. But of course their friends know. Some of them knew before they did, but his mom doesn’t need to know that.</p><p class="p1">“Okay, try to keep it that way. Because you might not feel this way right now, but you might change your mind at some point, and you don’t want something like this following you. Because it will follow you. Forever. Does that make sense?”</p><p class="p1">He nods.</p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p2"> </p><p class="p2"> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thanks for reading!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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